Wednesday, August 29, 2007

Get your mocking shoes on, baby!

BACKGROUNDY MATERIAL: When I was but a mere slip of a girl (proof to come), I was very very very involved in band.

I'll take a time out here for the uproarious laughter to die down, because the next line? Is even better.

I was SO involved in band that I decided to follow in my older brother's footsteps and try to be the Drum Major of the marching band (BTW: "marching band" is "Marschierenkapelle" in German. You're welcome). Hey! Why NOT seal my fate as an uber-dork? I mean, I was already in girl scouts and church choir and as many honor societies as you could count on three fingers, so why NOT be a drum major? What's to lose?

My thoughts exactly.

I tried out at the end of my sophomore year (big bro was headed off to college, y'all, so there was an opening), and I got the job.

Dudes, I was a 16-year old tough shit drum major, baby, and I instantly set about proving to everyone that I could totally rock the podium and be the boss of YOU. Herein then, are a few pictures of me as I tried to "find my inner George Parks." (and if you get THAT reference then we have much to talk about, because I might be in love with you.)

1) Sweet 16, and never been kissed (at least not like I wanted to be kissed and so I acted all tough and stuff to make up for the wanting of the kissing). That's me totally sporting the Prince Valiant hairdo, and my Dad's finger going all UFO on the top there.

2) An action shot.

Holy Cats that's one tall podium - you'd think they wanted the people in the parking lot to be able to see us up there and keep time.

The other drum major there? The one standing off to the left? He was a senior, and got fired before Spring Marching season for, um, being a drunk. Turns out that failing to show up at practice, or showing up and not being able to stand at attention, is a bad bad thing when you're a hand-waving poofter. Too bad too, because he an I won a "best drum majors" award at a competition. We looked pretty darned good together, and had a vicious wicked salute.

No, I don't know what the dance team is doing. Perhaps an early version of "Riverdance"?

3) Here's me and a buncha friends after a marching competition in Orlando the Srring of my Junior year. I was the ONLY "HWP" at that time (no replacement was hired for Drunky McLushypants), and had a beastly job of it, because one football field + 140 musicians + 20 Swiss Flag schpinners + a stupid number of dance team chicks = the very real chance for disaster and attendant exhaustion. I ran my a** off in the show, from one side of the field to the other and back again, like a retarded corps-style chihuahua. Therefore, the happy look on my face, once it was all over.

4) AH - me as a senior year HWP. Note the white skirt. Niiiiice. FYI - I wore a pair of yellow dance pants under that sucker, because that was the year that SOMEONE convinced the band director that having the two (yes, back to TWO!) HWPs do a disco dance to "Copacabana", which involved much spinning and dippage, was going to win shows.

It did not.

Therefore I am not posting pictures of me disco-ing with JD Henson in my right sharp outfit with the yellow dance pants. It was not a winning idea then, and it is not now. This lone picture of us badassingit off-field will have to do:

(The red eyes of the haunted Drum Majors are going to get yoooooo!!!!)

5) Then, just because there's a certain amount of stupidity running rampant through my very being, I present to you a picture of me on my 18th birthday. I was perilously close to graduation. 18. Damn. I thought I owned the world.

This was the day after I'd tried to go out the night before to buy beer, being as how an 18-year-old could buy beer legally at the time. It was 12:02 a.m. when I plunked the beer on the counter. I was turned down at 12:02:05 a.m., because there's no beer sales after midnight in Virginny, no matter if it IS your effing birthday and even if you DO have your effing lisence to prove you're legal. So, my friend Jeannie and I went to her house and drank a pitcher of screwdrivers instead. Yes, I drove home.

Looking at this pic, I don't think I'd let me out of the house if I was my parents. Stangely enough, they trusted me. Heh - not but a few weeks later I was hanging out at Rehoboth Beach with a houseful of friends for a week - our graduation gift to ourselves. We all came back alive, and nobody (as far as I know) got pregnant, so all in all it was a successful trip.

A month after this I was headed out to Wyoming with a bus fulla girl scouts to go camping. Yes, the dichotomy in my activities does strike me as rather odd, now that you mention it. :>

So, there ya go. Proof POSITIVE that I was a Hand Waving Poofter of the highest order, and damned proud of it. I still am, and would be proud of the Things if they were too. Mock me if you will, that's YOUR choice, but I'm betting YOU don't have awesome band camp stories, do ya? Huh? Do ya PUNK?